XI.  3 


Special  Libraries 


Vol.  5 


WAY,  1914 


No.  5 


PUBLISHED  BY  THE 
SPECIAL  LIBRARIES  ASSOCIATION 

Monthly  except  July  and  August. 

Editorial  and  Publication  Office,  State  Library, 
Indianapolis,  Ind. 

Subscriptions,  93  Broad  street,  Boston,  Mass. 
Entered  at  the  Postoffice  at  Indianapolis,  Ind., 

as  second-class  matter. 

Subscription .$2.00  a year  (10  numbers) 

Single  copies  25  cents 

President D.  N.  Handy 

Insurance  Library  Association,  Boston,  Mass. 

Vice-President Rv  H.  Johnston 

Bureau  of  Railway  Economics,’  Washington, 
D.  C. 

Secretary-Treasurer Guy  E.  Marion 

Library,  Arthur  D.  Little,  Inc.,  93  Broad 
street,  Boston,  Mass. 


EXECUTIVE  BOARD 

President,  Vice-President,  Secretary-Treasurer, 
J.  C.  Dana,  Newark  Public  Library  ; Clarence 
B.  Lester,  Wisconsin  Legislative  Reference 
Library. 

Managing  Editor  of  Special  Libraries : — John  A. 
Lapp,  Bureau  of  Legislative  Information,  In- 
dianapolis, Ind. 

Assistant  Editor,  Ethel  Cleland,  Bureau  of  Leg- 
islative Information,  Indianapolis,  Ind. 

CONTRIBUTING  EDITORS 

F.  N.  Morton,  United  Gas  Improvement  Co., 
Philadelphia. 

H.  H.  B.  Meyer,  Library  of  Congress. 

D.  N.  Handy,  Insurance  Library  Association. 


Special  Libraries  and  Shoes 

The  late  O.  Henry  tells  a story  of  a discouraged  shop-keeper 
who  lived  somewhere  “up  in  the  states”  and  who  was  persuaded 
to  embark  in  the  mercantile  business  in  Central  America.  A shoe 
store  seemed  the  right  stepping  stone  to  international  fame  and  fortune 
because  of  inviting  representations  of  the  special  opportunities  in  this 
business.  Friends  that  lived  in  Central  America  wrote  the  shop- 
keeper that  their  town,  although  it  had  a large  population,  had  not  a 
single  shoe  store.  The  shop-keeper  lost  no  time  in  preparing  for  shift- 
ing his  residence  and  seat  of  commercial  activity.  He  sold  out  his 
business  in  the  “states”,  invested  the  proceeds  in  a new  stock  of 
shoes  and  loaded  them  on  the  steamer  for  Central  America.  When 
he  arrived  in  the  town  he  found  the  representations  previously  made 
with  regard  to  the  population  were  true,  also,  there  were  no  shoe 
stores  in  the  town.  A few  days  later,  however,  he  discovered  a 
very  important  bit  of  information  which  he  should  have  obtained  be- 
fore embarking  in  the  shoe  business  in  Central  America.  He  learned 
that  ninety  percent  of  the  people  of  Central  America  went  bare- 
footed twelve  months  in  the  year. 


If  this  disappointed  shop-keeper  had  had  access  to  a special 
library  on  the  shoe  business  and  had  known  how  to  use  it,  he  would 
have  been  spared  the  humiliation  of  trying  to  sell  shoes  in  a land 
where  people  have  no  need  for  them  and  also  v he  would  have 
avoided  a considerable  loss  of  money,  which  is  more  important. 


CARL  MOTE. 


70 


SPECIAL  LIBRARIES 


The  Evolution  of  the  Special  Library 

By  John  Cotton  Dana,  Librarian,  the  Newark  Free  Library  (Abridged  from  The  Newarker). 


The  character  of  libraries,  their  scope 
and  the  methods  of  managing  them  depend 
ultimately  on  the  character  and  quantity  of 
things  intended  to  be  read.  When  things 
to  be  read  were  written  upon  stone,  whether 
in  hieroglyphics  or  in  sculptures  or  in  orna- 
ments of  buildings,  libraries  were  unknown. 
When  things  to  be  read  were  impressed 
upon  bits  of  clay  which  were  dried  or  baked, 
and  preserved  as  records,  collections  of 
those  records  were  made  and  kept,  and 
libraries  began.  When  things  to  be  read 
were  written  upon  paper  or  any  of  the 
many  kinds  of  material  which  were  used 
before  paper  was  invented,  it  was  clearly 
wise  to  collect  them,  store  them  safely  and 
arrange  them  conveniently  for  use.  Things 
to  be  read  thus  gathered  and  housed  formed 
the  first  libraries  properly  so  called. 

The  Ancient,  and  Surviving,  Reverence  for 
Books. 

After  the  invention  of  printing,  things  in- 
tended to  be  read  became  more  common; 
but,  as  they  were  still  quite  rare  and  expen- 
sive, the  old  methods  of  collecting  and  pre- 
serving them  were  kept  up  and  the  habit 
of  giving  them  a certain  reverence  was  con- 
tinued. 

The  reverence  was  due  in  part  to  the 
fact  that  few  could  either  write  or  read, 
in  part  to  the  rarity  of  books,  in  part  to  the 
mystery  attached  by  the  ignorant  to  the  art 
of  reading;  but  chiefly  to  the  fact  that  writ- 
ing and  reading  and  the  practice  of  preserv- 
ing books  were  largely  confined  to  expo- 
nents of  accepted  religious  cults. 

As  time  went  on  and  books  increased  in 
number  and  reading  became  more  common, 
this  reverence  for  the  book  decreased,  but 
it  decreased  very  slowly. 

Books  were  for  the  promotion  of  culture. 
Culture  was  something  which  the  upper 
classes  only  had  a right  to  get.  Science 
was  pursued  by  few,  and  those  few  were 
scarcely  admitted  to  the  aristocracy  of  book- 
users.  It  is  only  within  very  recent  years 
that  in  England,  for  example,  the  study  of 
medicine  and  its  allied  subjects,  even  if  car- 
ried on  to  most  helpful  results,  gave  him 
who  followed  it  a good  position  in  the  social 
hierarchy. 

What  Our  Fathers  Called  “Real  Books.” 

The  real  books  in  the  opinion  of  the  edu- 
cated among  the  upper  classes,  and,  indeed, 
among  all  of  the  members  of  the  upper 
classes  who  were  competent  to  form  opin- 
ions, were  held  to  be,  first,  the  literary  mas- 
terpieces, the  books  which  time  had  spared 


because  they  were  thought  to  tell  things  so 
skillfully  as  to  make  them  of  interest  and 
value  to  all  men  for  all  time.  Among  these 
were  included  all  the  older  Greek  and  Latin 
writings,  which  were  looked  upon  in  a cer- 
tain awe,  largely  because  they  wTere  in 
Greek  and  Latin.  Second,  books  on  these 
classic  books,  studies,  expositions,  crit- 
icisms. Third,  books  on  religious  subjects 
and  especially  on  theology  in  all  its  phases, 
and  including  philosophy.  These  books  con- 
tinued to  form  the  greater  part  of  libraries 
until  within  a few  years. 

Library  Proprieties  in  1876. 

When  the  public  library  movement  took 
form  and  celerity  in  our  country,  about 
forty  years  ago,  the  accepted  field  of  library 
book  collection  had  widened  to  cover  all 
kinds  of  writings.  Novels  were  still  looked 
on  with  a little  disfavor,  unless  they  were 
by  writers  time  had  tried  and  the  ministry 
approved;  science  was  closely  looked  at  to 
see  that  it  did  not  incline  to  infidelity;  and 
discussions  of  sex  and  society  and  govern- 
ment were  feared  as  tending  to  promote  im- 
morality and  insurrection.  On  the  whole, 
however,  almost  anything  that  had  the  form 
of  a book  could  find  a place  in  the  public 
library  of  forty  years  ago,  even  though  it 
might  not  be  thought  proper  to  admit  it  to 
the  presence  of  a mere  reader. 

As  a collection  of  all  printed  books  the 
library  had  arrived;  as  a something  estab- 
lished to  gather  all  knowledge  and  all 
thought  that  the  same  might  be  freely  used 
by  all  classes  of  the  community,  it  had  not. 

The  failure  of  the  public  library  of  forty 
years  ago  to  address  itself  to  all  the  com- 
munity without  distinction  of  wealth,  social 
standing  or  education,  and  its  failure,  so 
far  as  it  did  so  address  itself,  to  find  its 
advances  welcomed  and  its  advantages 
made  use  of,  were  due  to  two  factors  chief- 
ly: The  tendency  of  the  librarian  to  think 
of  his  collections  as  rather  for  the  learned 
than  for  the  learner,  and  the  tendency  of 
the  community  at  large  to  think  of  a col- 
lection of  books  as  rather  exclusively  de- 
signed for  those. who  had  been  reared  to 
use  them. 

How  the  Library  Idea  Was  Broadened. 

This  long-continued,  self-imposed  opinion 
as  to  the  proper  limitations  of  the  library- 
using group  was  broadened  in  due  course 
for  several  reasons. 

The  output  of  print  increased  with  great 
rapidity;  and  the  newspapers,  to  speak  of 
one  form  only  of  printed  things,  caused  a 
rapid  growth  in  the  reading  habit  and  led 


SPECIAL  LIBRARIES 


71 


millions  to  gain  a superficial  knowledge  of 
many  aspects  of  life  and  thought. 

Public  and  private  schools  and  colleges 
taught  more  subjects  and  taught  them  bet- 
ter, until  finally  the  sciences  were,  a few 
years  ago,  admitted  as  proper  fields  of 
knowledge  and  tools  of  discipline  even  to 
the  most  conservative  of  English  univer- 
sities. From  acquaintance  with  a wide 
range  of  required  school  reading  it  was  but 
a step  to  the  demand  that  a still  wider 
range  be  furnished  by  the  public  library. 

The  habit  of  reading  increased  very  rap- 
idly among  women.  More  of  them  became 
teachers,  more  of  them  entered  industrial 
life,  more  of  them  joined  study  clubs,  and 
these  changes  in  their  forms  of  activity  all 
led  to  an  increase  of  reading,  to  a wider 
range  of  reading  and  to  a notable  and  insist- 
ent demand  upon  libraries  that  they  furnish 
the  books  and  journals  on  whatsoever  sub- 
jects woman’s  broadening  interests  included. 

Indeed,  a certain  almost  apostolic  devo- 
tion to  the  reading  done  by  children  and 
an  enthusiastic  welcoming  of  women  as 
readers  and  students  have  been  two  of  the 
most  marked  features  in  the  development 
of  the  library  work  in  the  last  twenty  years. 

The  Radical  Change  in  Library  Work  Now 
Under  Way. 

Another  change  in  library  activities  is 
now  taking  place,  and  is  being  mainly 
brought  about  by  the  increase  in  things 
printed,  already  alluded  to.  And  here  it 
may  be  well  to  refer  to  the  opening  state- 
ment, that  the  character  of  library  man- 
agement is  dependent  on  the  character  and 
quantity  of  things  to  be  read;  and  to  call 
attention  to  the  fact  that  the  immediate 
causes  of  changes  in  the  contents  and  ad- 
ministration of  libraries — newspapers,  chil- 
dren’s wider  reading,  women’s  greater  in- 
terest in  world-knowledge — are  themselves 
largely  the  results  of  the  growth  of  print 
and  the  resulting  increase  in  things  to  be 
read. 

The  Amazing  Growth  of  Print. 

Modem  invention,  making  printing  much 
cheaper  than  formerly,  has  led  inevitably 
to  a tremendous  growth  in  output.  And  by 
way  of  explanation  of,  though  not  as  an 
excuse  for,  the  failure  of  librarians  as  a 
class  to  realize  the  great  changes  in  scope 
and  method  of  library  management  which 
the  growth  of  printing  and  of  the  use  of 
things  printed  will  soon  bring,  it  may  be 
said  that  printing  and  print-using  gained 
their  present  astounding  rate  of  increase 
only  within  the  past  ten  or  fifteen  years. 
Few  yet  realize  that  printing  is  only  now, 
after  450  years  of  practice  of  the  art,  at  the 
very  earliest  stages  of  its  development  and 
is  but  beginning  to  work  on  mankind  its 
tremendous  and  incalculable  effects. 

The  increase  of  print  is  marked  in  new 
book  production ; is  far  more  marked  in  peri- 


odical literature;  perhaps  still  more  in  the 
publications  of  public  institutions  and  pri- 
vate associations;  still  more  again  in  the 
field  of  advertising  by  poster,  circular,  pic- 
ture and  pamphlet;  and  perhaps  most  of 
all  in  the  mere  commercial  wrapper. 

Print  Grows  by  Being  Consumed! 

Every  added  piece  of  print  helps  to  add 
new  or  more  facile  and  more  eager  readers 
to  the  grand  total  of  print  consumers.  As 
commerce  and  industry  have  grown,  print 
has  increased  also,  and  naturally  and  in- 
evitably more  rapidly  than  either. 

Considered  merely  as  an  industry  and 
measured  by  money  invested  and  value  of 
output,  print  seems  to  be  growing  now  fast- 
er than  any  other  of  the  great  industries, 
among  which  it  is  one  of  the  first;  and  in 
view  of  the  fact  that  a like  expenditure 
each  year  produces,  thanks  to  invention  and 
discovery,  a greater  output  of  things  to  be 
read,  it  must  be  admitted  that  in  its  prod- 
ucts, properly  measured,  print  today  stands 
in  the  front  rank  of  all  our  manufactures. 

The  Need  of  Mastering  Mere  Knowledge 

and  the  Difficulty  Thereof. 

As  modern  production,  commerce,  trans- 
portation and  finance  have  grown  and  be- 
come more  complicated,  they  have  found  in 
print  a tool  which  can  be  well  used  in  the 
effort  to  master  the  mass  of  facts  which 
daily  threatens  to  overwhelm  even  the  most 
skillful  in  their  efforts  at  safe  and  profitable 
industrial  management.  In  spite  of  all  that 
is  reported  in  print  of  things  done,  projects 
planned,  tests  made,  results  reached,  in  the 
ten  thousand  wide-ranging  lines  of  the 
world’s  work — from  a new  gold  reef  of  un- 
exampled richness  in  the  fastnesses  of  New 
Guinea’s  mountains,  to  the  new  use  of  a by- 
product of  a city’s  garbage,  much  escapes, 
or,  being  printed,  is  unknown  to,  him  who 
can  use  it  to  his  advantage.  And  so  our 
worldy  information  goes  on  piling  up;  not 
all  of  it  in  print,  but  so  much  of  it  in  print 
as  to  make  that  which  is  printed  almost  im- 
possible of  control. 

Other-Worldly  Literature. 

The  problem  of  efficient  handling  of 
worldly  information  is  difficult  enough  in 
itself,  but  to  this  is  added  what  we  may 
call  in  contrast  other-worldly  information. 
Social  questions  which  were  seemingly  quite 
few  in  number  only  a generation  ago,  have 
multiplied  marvelously  as  modern  indus- 
trialism and  universal  education  have  pro- 
duced their  inevitable  result  of  complicat- 
ing our  social  structure. 

These  social  questions  demand  solution; 
societies  to  solve  them  straightway  arise, 
and  proceed  to  inquire,  to  study,  to  investi- 
gate, to  experiment,  and  to  publish  results. 
These  published  results  inevitably  throw 
light  on  the  daily  routine  of  the  industrial- 


72 


SPECIAL  LIBRARIES 


ist,  a routine  already  complex  enough;  also, 
they  tend  to  modify  public  opinion  or  even 
almost  to  create  a new  and  hitherto  un- 
heard of  public  opinion,  and  this  new-born 
opinion  again  affects,  and  often  most  serir 
ously,  the  industrialist’s  routine^  Mean- 
while this  new  social  service  spirit  takes 
hold  upon  questions  of  government,  com- 
plicates them,  gives  unexpected  answers  to 
them,  reverses  the  old  ones*  and,  so  doing, 
affects  in  a startling  way  the  attempts  of 
the  industrialist  to  establish  and  maintain 
his  routine. 

Of  all  this  social-service  and  government 
activity  the  printed  output  is  amazingly 
multitudinous. 

In  any  city  of  moderate  size  the  social 
service  institutions,  including  departments 
of  the  city,  county,  state  and  national  gov- 
ernment, and  the  private  and  quasi-public 
organizations  which  are  attempting  to  mod- 
ify opinions,  customs,  ordinances  and  laws 
directly  or  indirectly,  through  study,  experi- 
ment, investigation,  exhortation  and  de- 
mand, are  so  numerous,  so  active,  so  per- 
sistent and  in  the  main  so  effective,  and 
publish  annually  so  many  thousand  pieces 
of  things  to  be  read,  as  to  make  it  almost 
impossible  for  any  organization  to  have  in 
hand  full  knowledge  of  them  all.  Yet  upon 
every  enterprise  in  that  city  many  of  these 
countless  institutions  have  already  produced 
an  effect,  or  will  tomorrow,  next  week  or 
next  year.  The  wise  industrialist  would 
take  them  into  account  in  planning  his  cam- 
paigns, and  finds  it  extremely  difficult  to 
do  so. 

The  Literature  of  Science  and  the  Arts. 

Add  to  this  other-worldly  literature  the 
tremendous  stream  of  worldly  literature  al- 
ready alluded  to,  and  include  in  the  latter 
the  vast  flood  of  trade,  technical  and  scien- 
tific journals,  proceedings  of  societies  and 
books  and  brochures  from  individuals;  and 
then  consider  the  difficulties  which  confront, 
on  the  one  hand,  the  industrialist  who  would 
know  of  the  social,  economic,  industrial, 
technical  and  scientific  changes,  advances 
and  movements  which  may  affect  his  enter- 
prise; and  confront,  on  the  other  hand,  the 
organization,  be  it  public  or  private,  which 
is  trying  to  keep  him  duly  informed!  More- 
over, beyond  all  this  is  the  vast  field  of  re- 
search within  which  countless  widely  scat- 
tered workers,  who  for  lack  of  swift  inter- 
change of  knowledge  of  their  respective 
successes  and  failures  are  wasting  their 
time  on  misdirected  and  needless  effort. 

The  Changes  Demanded  in  Library  Method. 

The  change  which  this  swift  growth  of 
things-intended-to-be  read  is  today  imposing 
on  libraries  can  now  be  roughly  outlined. 

They  may  properly  continue  to  serve  the 
student,  in  the  old  sense  of  that  word,  the 
child  and  the  inquiring  woman;  they  must 
also  serve  the  industrialist,  the  investigator 


or  scientist  and  the  social  service  worker. 

It  is  too  soon  to  say  in  just  what  man- 
ner this  new  form  of  service  will  be  ren- 
dered. The  difference  in  the  amount  of  ma- 
terial to  be  mastered  makes  a wise  method 
of  administration  most  difficult  of  discov- 
ery; and  added  to  this  great  difference  in 
amount  is  a difference  in  what  one  may  call 
the  proper  length  of  life. 

The  technique  of  the  management  of 
printed  material  gathered  by  libraries  has, 
in  its  development  in  the  past  forty  years, 
been  devoted  almost  solely  to  the  accurate 
description,  complete  indexing  and  careful 
preservation  of  that  material.  So  elaborate 
was  the  ritual  in  this  field  which  was  es- 
tablished and  quite  generally  adopted  some 
twenty  years  ago  that  today  it  costs  a 
library  of  moderate  size  from  twenty  to 
fifty  cents  merely  to  prepare  and  put  on 
the  shelf  each  one  of  its  collected  items, 
be  the  same  a pamphlet  of  four  pages  cost- 
ing nothing  or  a scientific  treatise  of  a 
thousand  pages  costing  ten  dollars.  And 
this  takes  no  account  of  binding. 

It  would  be  useless  to  attempt  here  to 
describe  or  to  enumerate  the  countless 
sources  from  which  comes  this  mass  of 
material  which  confronts  us,  and  demands 
of  the  librarian  a reasonable  control.  It 
comes  from  governmental  bodies,  public  and 
quasi-public  institutions  and  businesses; 
from  private  bodies,  scientific,  artistic,  phil- 
osophic, educational,  philanthropic,  social; 
and  from  private  individuals.  It  even  in- 
cludes print  which  is  designed  to  advertise 
but  informs  as  well;  and  in  this  line  thou- 
sands of  makers  of  things  are  putting  out 
printed  notes  on  optics,  chemistry,  travel, 
food,  machines,  machine  products  and  a 
thousand  other  subjects,  which  often  con- 
tain later  and  fuller  and  more  accurate  in- 
formation than  can  be  gained  elsewhere. 

The  Problem  of  the  Print  Which  Is  Useful 
and  Yet  Ephemeral. 

Nearly  all  this  vast  flood  of  print,  to  the 
control  of  which  libraries  must  now  in  some 
degree  address  themselves,  is  in  pamphlet 
form,  and,  what  seems  to  be  of  the  utmost 
importance  in  considering  the  problem  of 
how  to  handle  it,  nearly  all  of  it  is,  as 
already  noted,  ephemeral.  Herein,  also,  as 
already  said,  is  a characteristic  which  dis- 
tinguishes it  from  nearly  all  the  printed 
material  with  which  librarians  have  hereto- 
fore busied  themselves. 

Everything  intended  to  be  read  which 
comes  into  a library’s  possession  must  be 
preserved — such  is  the  doctrine  based  on 
the  old  feeling  of  the  sanctity  of  print  which 
once  was  almost  universally  accepted.  Even 
to  this  day  those  are  to  be  found  who  urge 
the  library  of  a small  town  to  gather  and 
preserve  all  they  can  lay  hands  on  of  all 
that  is  printed  in  or  about  that  town.  When 
President  Eliot  of  Harvard  a few  years  ago, 
seeing  clearly,  as  can  any  whose  eyes  are 


SPECIAL  LIBRARIES 


73 


open  to  the  progress  of  printing,  that  print 
may  overwhelm  ns  if  we  do  not  master  it, 
urged  that  great  libraries  be  purged  of  dead 
things,  the  voice  of  the  spirit  of  print  wor- 
ship of  a hundred  years  ago  was  heard  pro- 
claiming that  nothing  that  is  printed,  once 
gathered  and  indexed,  can  be  spared. 
Whereas,  did  any  large  library  attempt  to 
gather,  and  set  in  order  for  use  under  the 
technique  now  followed,  as  large  a propor- 
tion of  all  that  is  now  printed,  as  it  did  of 
what  was  printed  in  1800,  it  would  bankrupt 
its  community. 

The  amazing  growth  of  the  printing  indus- 
try is  overturning  the  old  standards  of  value 
of  things  printed  and  the  old  methods  of  use, 
has  indeed  already  done  it,  though  few  as 
yet  realize  that  this  is  so. 

To  establish  this  fact  is  one  of  the  pri- 
mary purposes  of  the  whole  argument.  To 
emphasize  its  truth,  two  more  things  may  be 
mentioned,  the  moving  picture  film  and  the 
phonographic  record.  Historically  these  are 
as  important  as  are  any  printed  records  of 
our  time.  Yet  what  library  dare  take  upon 
itself  the  task  of  gathering  and  preserving 
and  indexing  them? 

Here  we  have  two  kinds  of  records  of 
contemporary  life,  both  closely  allied  in 
character  to  printed  things,  which  the  all- 
inclusive  library  does  not  even  attempt  to 
gather,  list  and  index.  Difficult  as  it  would 
be  for  any  one  library,  or  even  any  group 
of  large  libraries,  to  collect  and  preserve  all 
these  records  of  the  human  voice  and  of  the 
visible  activities  of  men,  still  more  difficult 
would  it  be  to  gather  and  save  all  that  is 
printed  today. 

The  Proper  View  of  What  to  Do  With 
Print. 

The  proper  view  of  printed  things  is,  that 
the  stream  thereof  need  not  he  anywhere 
completely  stored  behind  the  dykes  and 
dams  formed  by  the  shelves  of  any  library 
or  of  any  group  of  libraries ; but  that  from 
that  stream  as  it  rushes  by  expert  observers 
should  select  ivhat  is  pertinent  each  to  his 
own  constituency,  to  his  own  organization, 
to  his  own  community,  hold  it  as  long  as  it 
continues  to  have  value  to  those  for  whom 
he  selects  it,  make  it  easily  accessible  by 
some  simple  process,  and  then  let  it  go. 

Both  the  expert  and  the  student  may  rest 
assured  that  the  cheapness  of  the  printing 
process  of  our  day  and  the  natural  zeal  and 
self-interest  of  inquirers,  students,  compil- 
ers, indexers  and  publishers,  will  see  to  it 
that  nothing  that  is  of  permanent  value, 
once  put  in  print,  is  ever  lost.  Not  only  are 
there  made  in  these  days  compilations  and 
abstracts  innumerable  by  private  individu- 
als for  their  own  pleasure  and  profit;  but 
also  a very  large  and  rapidly  increasing 
number  of  societies  are  devoting  large  sums 
of  money,  high  skill  and  tireless  industry 
to  gathering,  abstracting  and  indexing  rec- 
ords of  human  thought,  research  and  indus- 
try in  all  their  forms. 


The  New  Library  Creed. 

Select  the  best  books,  list  them  elabo- 
rately, save  them  forever — was  the  sum  of 
the  librarians'  creed  of  yesterday.  Tomor- 
row it  must  be,  select  a few  of  the  best 
books  and  keep  them,  as  before,  but  also,  se- 
lect from  the  vast  flood  of  print  the  things 
your  constituency  will  find  helpful,  make 
them  available  with  a minimum  of  expense, 
and  discard  them  as  soon  as  their  usefulness 
is  past. 

This  latter  creed  has  been  as  yet  adopted 
by  very  few  practicing  librarians.  It  is 
gaining  followers,  however,  in  the  fields  of 
research  and  industry  whose  leaders  are 
rapidly  and  inevitably  learning  that  only 
by  having  accessible  all  the  records  of  ex- 
periment, exploration  and  discovery  pertain- 
ing to  their  own  enterprise,  wherever  made, 
can  they  hope  to  avoid  mistakes,  escape 
needless  expenditures  and  make  profitable 
advances  in  any  department  of  science  or  in 
any  kind  of  industrial  or  social  work. 

Special  Libraries  and  Their  Association. 

In  recent  years  has  arisen  an  organiza- 
tion called  the  Special  Libraries  Associa- 
tion. It  came  into  being  in  this  way: 

A few  large  enterprises,  private,  public 
and  quasi-public  discovered  that  it  paid  to 
employ  a skilled  person  and  ask  him  to  de- 
vote all  his  time  to  gathering  and  arrang- 
ing printed  material  out  of  which  he  could 
supply  the  leaders  of  the  enterprise,  on  de- 
mand or  at  stated  intervals,  with  the  latest 
information  on  their  work. 

This  librarian  purchased  periodicals,  jour- 
nals, proceedings  of  societies,  leaflets, 
pamphlets,  and  books  on  the  special  field  in 
which  his  employers  were  interested,  studied 
them,  indexed  them,  or  tore  or  clipped  from 
them  pertinent  material  and  filed  it  under 
proper  headings,  and  then  either  held  him- 
self in  readiness  to  guide  managers,  fore- 
men and  others  directly  to  the  latest  infor- 
mation on  any  topics  they  might  present,  or 
compiled  each  week  or  each  month  a list  of 
pertinent,  classified  references  to  the  last 
words  from  all  parts  of  the  world  on  the 
fields  covered  by  his  organization’s  activi- 
ties, and  laid  a copy  of  this  list  on  the  desk 
of  every  employe  who  could  make  good  use 
of  it. 

Roughly  described,  this  is  the  method  of 
controlling  the  special  information  the  world 
was  offering  them  which  perhaps  not  more 
than  a score  of  progressive  institutions  had 
found  it  wise  to  adopt  up  to  five  or  six  years 
ago. 

Newark’s  Special  Library. 

At  that  time  the  public  library  of  Newark 
was  developing  what  it  called  a library  for 
men  of  affairs,  a business  branch.  This  was 
in  a rented  store  close  to  the  business  and 
transportation  center  of  the  city.  The  li- 
brary’s management  believed  that  men  and 
women  who  were  engaged  in  manufactur- 


74 


SPECIAL  LIBRARIES 


ing,  commerce,  transportation,  finance,  in- 
surance, and  allied  activities  could  profita- 
bly make  greater  use  than  they  had  here- 
tofore of  information  to  be  found  in  print. 
They  were  sure  that  this  useful  industrial 
information  existed,  for  they  knew  that  the 
most  progressive  among  men  of  affairs  in 
this  country,  and  still  more  in  Germany, 
found  and  made  good  use  of  it.  Indeed,  they 
knew  that  they  already  had  in  the  main 
library’s  collections  much  material  which 
almost  any  industrial  organization  and  al- 
most any  industrial  worker  could  consult 
with  profit.  Such  material  was  already  used 
to  a slight  extent  in  the  central  building; 
but  they  believed  that  if  what  might  be 
called  “the  printed  material  fundamental  to 
a great  manufacturing  and  commercial 
city”  were  so  placed  and  so  arranged  that 
it  could  be  easily  consulted  by  men  of  busi- 
ness, the  habit  of  using  it  would  spread 
very  rapidly. 

An  Uncharted  Sea  of  Print. 

Prom  the  first  it  was  evident  that  the  li- 
brary was  entering  a field  not  yet  greatly 
cultivated.  There  were  no  guides  to  selec- 
tion of  material;  there  were  no  precedents 
to  serve  as  rules  for  handling  it  when  found. 
Professional  library  literature  did  not  help, 
because  this  particular  form  of  library 
work  had  never  been  undertaken.  It  was 
not  difficult  to  learn  that  the  old  rule,  gath- 
er everything  possible,  index  and  save  for- 
ever, must  here  be  in  the  main,  discarded, 
and  the  new  rule,  select,  examine,  use  and 
discard  be  adopted. 

But  to  put  the  new  rule  into  practice 
was  very  difficult. 

An  Association  of  Inquirers. 

This  question  naturally  arose,  are  others 
attempting  work  at  all  similar  to  this  of 
ours?  Inquiry  soon  brought  to  light  a few 
librarians  of  private  corporations,  public 
service  institutions  and  city  and  state  gov- 
ernments which,  as  already  noted,  were  also 
working  on  the  new  line.  Correspondence 
and  conference  followed;  an  organization 
for  mutual  aid  promised  to  be  helpful  and 
the  Special  Libraries  Association  was 
formed. 

Merely  as  a matter  of  history,  and  chiefly 
because  the  active  and  skillful  workers  who 
now  have  the  movement  in  hand,  promise 
to  make  of  this  association  an  institution  of 
very  great  importance,  it  may  be  well  to 
state  here  that  the  suggestion  of  an  organi- 
zation of  those  engaged  in  what  may  be 
called  the  sheer  utilitarian  management  of 
print,  was  made  by  the  Newark  library, 
and  that  from  that  library  and  from  the  li- 
brary of  the  Merchants’  Association  of  New 
York,  were  sent  out  the  invitations  to  a pre- 
liminary conference  at  Bretton  Woods,  in 
July,  1909. 

Representatives  of  about  a dozen  special 


libraries  were  present,  and  the  librarians  of 
several  public  and  university  libraries  as 
well. 

When  is  a Library  Special? 

The  name  Special  Libraries  was  chosen 
with  some  hesitation,  and  rather  in  default 
of  a better;  but  it  has  seemed  to  fit  the 
movement  admirably.  It  may  be  said,  of 
course,  that  every  library  is  in  a measure 
special,  in  its  own  field,  and  that  state  li- 
braries, libraries  of  colleges  and  universi- 
ties, of  medicine,  law,  history,  art  and  other 
subjects  may  be  called  special.  But  a spe- 
cial library,  and  the  special  departments  of 
more  general  libraries — like  the  business 
branch  in  Newark — are  the  first  and  as  yet 
almost  the  only  print-administering  institu- 
tions which  professedly  recognize  the  change 
in  library  method  that  the  vast  and  swiftly 
mounting  bulk  of  print  is  demanding;  rea- 
lize how  ephemeral,  and  at  the  same  time 
how  exceedingly  useful  for  the  day  and 
hour,  is  much  of  the  present  output  of 
things-intended-to-be-read,  and  frankly  adopt 
the  new  library  creed  as  to  print  manage- 
ment, of  careful  selection,  immediate  use 
and  ready  rejection  when  usefulness  is  past. 

The  Growth  of  the  New  Idea. 

The  story  of  the  growth  and  work  of  this 
association  of  special  libraries  not  only  dem- 
onstrates the  truth  of  the  statement  that 
the  modern  printing  press  is  giving  us  a 
new  view  of  its  own  importance  and  help- 
fulness, it  also  shows  how  rapidly  the  new 
view  is  being  taken  by  the  world  of  affairs; 
and,  furthermore,  it  suggests  some  of  the 
methods  to  which  adoption  of  the  new  li- 
brary creed  is  giving  rise. 

The  association  began  with  about  30  mem- 
bers, of  whom  more  than  half  represented 
special  libraries  that  could  be  properly  so 
called.  In  one  year  the  number  of  special 
library  representatives  increased  to  more 
than  70,  and  in  the  next  two  years  to  125. 
In  January,  1910,  the  association  began  the 
publication  of  a monthly  journal.  The  dis- 
tribution of  this  journal,  which  has  been 
very  wisely  and  economically  edited  and 
published  by  Mr.  John  A.  Lapp,  legislative 
reference  librarian  of  Indianapolis;  the  dis- 
tribution of  circular  letters,  reports  and 
articles  in  the  public  press;  the  meetings  of 
the  association  itself  and  of  sub-divisions  of 
it  and  outgrowths  from  it,  all  have  served 
as  an  excellent  and  effective  propaganda  of 
the  idea  of  the  systematic  use  of  print  in 
the  world  of  affairs. 

A list  of  special  libraries  in  this  country, 
published  in  Special  Libraries  for  April, 
1910,  not  including  libraries  of  law,  medi- 
cine, history  and  theology  and  including 
very  few  public,  scientific  and  reference  li- 
braries, gave  118  names. 

Most  of  the  libraries  that  have  joined  the 
association  since  its  first  year,  1909-10,  have 
come  into  existence  since  that  year.  They 


SPECIAL  LIBRARIES 


75 


{ now  increase  in  number  so  rapidly  that  it 
j is  impossible  to  keep  the  record  of  them 
complete.  One  can  only  say  that  managers 
, of  scientific,  engineering,  manufacturing, 
managerial,  commercial,  financial,  insur- 
[ ance,  advertising,  social  and  other  organiza- 
tions, including  states,  cities,  government 
i commissions  and  the  like,  are,  as  the  records 
( of  the  Special  Libraries  Association  show, 
coming  every  day  in  increasing  numbers  to 
( the  obvious  conclusion,  that  it  pays  to  em- 
ploy an  expert  who  shall  be  able,  when 
equipped  with  proper  apparatus,  to  give 
them  from  day  to  day  news  of  the  latest 
I movements  in  their  respective  fields. 

The  Journal,  “Special  Libraries/' 

| The  Journal,  Special  Libraries,  has  pub- 
; lished  a total  of  35  numbers,  over  400  pages, 
and  has  printed  scores  of  helpful  articles 
on  such  subjects  as  “The  earning  power  of 
special  libraries,”  “The  value  of  the  special 
library  for  the  business  man,  the  salesman  or 
the  shop  expert,”  “Industrial  libraries,”  “A 
reference  library  in  a manufacturing  plant,” 
and  many  carefully  prepared  lists  of  books, 
magazine  articles,  new  , legislative  enact- 
ments and  the  like,  with  titles  like  the  fol- 
lowing: Accounting,  Motion  pictures,  Open 
shop,  Short  ballot,  Efficiency,  Public  Utility 
rates. 

This  association  and  this  journal  are  de- 
scribed here  thus  fully  because  they  seem 
to  point  so  clearly  to  the  coming  change  in 
general  library  method  with  which  this 
whole  argument  concerns  itself.  In  this 
journal  we  find  recorded,  as  maintaining  li- 
braries for  the  special  purpose  of  gathering 
by  world-wide  search  all  that  can  throw 
light  on  their  work,  their  processes  of  man- 
ufacture, their  methods  of  sale  and  distri- 
bution, such  establishments  as  these: 

The  Amer.  Banker’s  Assn.,  N.  Y. ; the 

Amer.  Brass  Co.,  Waterbury,  Conn. : The 

Amer.  Tel.  & Tel.  Co.,  N.  Y. ; The  Boston 

Consol.  Cas  Co.;  The  National  Carbon  Co., 
Cleveland;  Stone  and  Webster,  Boston; 
United  Gas  Improvement  Co.,  Philadelphia. 

By  no  means  all  the  industrial  organiza- 
tions which  have  what  one  may  call  pro- 
prietary bureaus  of  research  have  become 
members  of  the  Association,  directly  or 

through  their  librarians.  In  fact,  as  al- 
ready stated,  there  must  be  many  of  these 
special  bureaus  of  which  the  Association 
has  as  yet  no  knowledge.  It  is  worth  not- 
ing, however,  that  representatives  of  many 
firms,  so  far  as  they  have  expressed  them- 
selves, are  enthusiastic  over  the  success  of 
their  new  department. 

The  Limitation  of  the  Older  Type  of 
Libraries. 

The  fact  that  we  now  have  an  active 
movement  for  the  establishment  within  large 
industrial  enterprises  of  special  depart- 
ments for  the  proper  control  of  all  pertinent 
printed  information,  is  of  itself  good  evi- 


dence that  the  needs  these  departments  sup- 
ply are  needs  which  public  and  college  li- 
braries of  the  conventional  type  are  not  sup- 
plying. Other  evidence  could  be  set  forth 
from  State  libraries,  municipal  libraries  and 
libraries  of  legislative  research. 

It  is  not  suggested  that  libraries  of  the 
type  of  ten  or  even  five  years  ago,  public, 
proprietary,  State,  historical,  could  ever  do 
the  work  which  the  enlightened  industrialist 
of  today  asks  of  the  special  print-handling 
department  he  sets  up  in  and  for  his  own 
organization.  But  this  seems  evident  enough 
from  all  that  has  been  said,  that  the  old  type 
of  library  must  modify  itself  in  accordance 
with  the  new  needs  which  the  evolution  of 
knowledge  and  the  growth  of  print  have 
created.  Speaking  of  the  free  public  library 
only — tho’  what  is  true  of  this  is  true  in  a 
measure  also  of  the  college,  university  or 
historical  library — it  should  try  to  master 
so  much  of  the  flood  of  print  as  is  of  im- 
portance to  its  community  as  a whole,  and 
to  those  aspects  of  industrial  life  which  are 
common  to  all  men  and  women  of  affairs  in 
its  community. 

This  paper  has  failed  of  its  main  purpose 
if  it  has  not  shown  that  the  public  library 
should  equip  itself  to  handle  a vast  amount 
of  ephemerally  useful  material,  and  should, 
by  its  methods  in  this  work,  suggest  to  the 
large  business  institutions  how  helpful  they 
would  find  the  adoption  of  similar,  work 
within  their  respective  fields. 

Definite  Suggestions:  Co-operation. 

One  may  here  ask  if  any  definite  sugges- 
tions can  be  made  as  to  the  selection  of  use- 
ful print  from  the  useless,  the  making  it 
temporarily  accessible,  and  discarding  it 
with  ease  when  its  usefulness  is  past.  As  al- 
ready stated,  these  are  the  questions  now 
confronting  librarians. 

As  to  solution,  one  plan  already  under 
way  may  be  mentioned.  Mr.  John  A.  Lapp, 
director  of  the  Bureau  of  Legislative  In- 
formation, Indianapolis,  has  established  a 
co-operative  enterprise  for  the  collection 
and  distribution  of  certain  social  and  law- 
making information.  From  25  to  100  li- 
braries and  individuals  each  contribute  $25 
per  year  for  maintenance. 

The  bureau,  called  “Public  Affairs  Infor- 
mation Service,”  collects  announcements  re- 
garding information  in  the  field  of  public 
affairs,  digests  the  same  and  distributes  the 
copies  of  the  digests  to  subscribers.  The 
information  concerns  such  subjects  as  these: 
Agricultural  Credit 
Civil  Service  Commissions 
Convict  Labor 
Dance  Hall  Legislation 
Drinking  Cup  Question 
Elimination  of  Party  Politics 
Occupational  Welfare 

Market’s,  Reorganization  in  New  York 
City 

Noise  Prevention 


76 


SPECIAL  LIBRARIES 


Municipal  Lodging  Houses 
Rural  Life,  Bibliography 
Prison  Laws,  Digest  of 
Under  heads  like  t these  a few  lines  give 
information  sufficient  to  guide  one  to  the 
source  of  printed  material  alluded  to,  with 
a note  outlining  its  scope. 

These  notes,  manifolded  on  sheets  con- 
venient for  clipping  and  filing,  are  sent  out 
to  all  the  libraries,  firms  and  individuals 
co-operating,  at  the  rate,  at  present,  of  about 
two  each  week,  each  containing  an  average 
of  20  notes.  The  notes  vary  greatly  in 
length.  A recent  one  gave  the  results  of  in- 
quiries into  the  progress,  in  every  state  in 
the  Union,  of  drinking  cup  legislation. 

It  is  impossible  to  set  any  limit  to  the 
growth  of  bureaus  of  information  of  this 
kind.  Every  one  must  make  for  economy 
of  time  and  labor  in  the  never-ending 
search,  going  on  in  every  ’ library,  in  every 
law-office,  in  every  large  industrial  and 
commercial  enterprise,  for  the  latest  news 
on  thousands  of  subjects  of  the  day. 


In  Boston  a bureau  of  information  has 
been  organized  by  several  libraries,  which 
has  a central  office  in  the  public  library  of 
the  city,  and  tries  to  discover  for  any  in- 
quirer, on  any  topic  whatsoever,  the  per- 
son, book,  library,  document,  report,  or 
what-not  that  can  give  the  precise  informa- 
tion he  needs  ill  the  shortest  possible  time. 

The  League  of  American  Municipalities 
has  long  had  in  view  a plan  for  establishing 
a central  municipal  bureau  which  should 
gather  notes  on  the  countless  activities  of 
all  our  large  cities  and  hold  them  in  readi- 
ness for  any  demand.  Such  a bureau  would 
not  only  save  to  every  city  department  in 
every  city  the  cost  of  making  its  own  in- 
quiries as  to  new  legislation,  administra- 
tion, experiments,  tests  of  paving,  lighting, 
etc.,  it  would  also  save  to  the  country  at 
large  much  of  the  present  vast  expenditure 
on  new  legislation  and  new  methods  of 
many  kinds  which  have  somewhere  already 
proven  failures. 


Tentative  Programme 

Annual  Convention  of  the  Special  Libraries  Association,  Affiliated  with  the 
American  Library  Association,  Washington,  D.  C. 


Wednesday,  May  27th — 2 p.  m. 

(Opening  Session) 

Note — At  the  request  of  the  programme 
committee  of  the  American  Library  Asso- 
ciation, the  set  parts  of  the  programme  have 
been  considerably  shortened  to  give  oppor- 
tunity for  visits  to  places  of  library  interest 
in  Washington. 

1.  Opening:  Brief  review  of  year  and  ex- 
planation of  current  programme  and  ends  to 
be  achieved. 

2.  Subject  of  afternoon:  Co-operative  in- 
formation getting:  What  has  been  and  is 
being  done — What  may  be  done. 

(a)  Report  Methods  followed  and  re- 
sults achieved  through  co-operation  of  forty 
legislative  reference  and  similar  libraries. 
By  John  A.  Lapp,  Director,  Indiana  Bureau 
of  Legislative  Information,  Indianapolis,  Ind. 

(b)  Report  Methods  followed  and  re- 
sults achieved  by  “International  Notes  and 
Queries,”  an  attempt  at  co-operation  for  the 
getting  of  information.  By  Eugene  F.  Mc- 
Pike,  Secretary,  American  Railway  Perish- 
able Freight  Association,  Editor  “Interna- 
tional Notes  and  Queries,”  Chicago. 

(c)  Report  The  New  Index  Office — Its 
aims,  methods  and  achievements.  By  A.  G. 
S.  Josephson,  Secretary,  Chicago,  111. 

(d)  Report  The  Boston  Co-qperative  In- 


formation Bureau  in  the  light  of  three  years 
of  service.  By  G.  W.  Lee,  President,  Boston, 
Mass. 

(e)  Discussion  from  the  floor.  General 
Theme:  “What  is  the  matter  -with  present 
co-operative  methods?  Are  the  methods  at 
fault  or  are  we  ourselves  a little  bit  queer?” 
An  opportunity  for  a delightful  session 
boosting  and  being  boosted  if  everybody  will 
only  unbend  and  dip  in. 

(f)  Co-operation  and  the  Special  Li- 
brarian— Can  librarians  themselves  co-op- 
erate in  ways  that  will  be  helpful  and  at  the 
same  time  practical?  Can  co-operation  be 
reduced  to  a simple  system  which  will  work 
itself?  By  R.  H.  Johnston,  Librarian,  Bu- 
reau of  Railway  Economics  Library,  Wash- 
ington, D.  C. 

Wednesday,  May  27th 

Evening  Session — 8 p.  m. 

Round  Table  Discussion 

Explanation — To  give  opportunity  for  the 
informal  consideration  by  small  groups  of 
persons  of  matters  of  more  limited  interest, 
the  Executive  Committee  have  arranged  for 
numerous  Round  Table  conferences,  each 
presided  over  by  a leader  chosen  because  of 
his  fitness  to  guide  the  discussion  into  help- 
ful and  practical  channels. 


